A Comprehensive History of Indian Buddhism

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This work, like his great work on Jainism, is a very informative text on the Life and Teachings of Gautama Buddha. It also contains chapters on the Pijakas and other Sanskrit Buddhist texts. We have no doubt that this work will be generously received by the scholars interested in Buddhism.

Dr. Asim Kumar Chatterjee obtained his doctorate Degree in the year 1968, from Calcutta University. He is the Author of several Books on Indology. His earliest work was published in 1970 from Calcutta. He has participated in Seminars held in Paris and Mexico city, respectively in the years 1973 and 1976. His best work is on JAINISM, which was published first from Calcutta in 1978, and again from New Delhi in 2000 A. D.

The author of this book on Buddhism published his first article in the Calcutta Review, New Series, Volume I. In 1969 which also includes writings of the then Governor of West Bengal. Dr. Harendranath Mukhopadhyay. Suniti Kumar Chatterji, Justice Hidayatullah and others. He obtained his Ph. D. degree in 1968 and joined the Department of Ancient Indian History & Culture, Calcutta University as a Lecturer in 1972. He became a Reader in 1982 and was appointed the Head of the Department in 1989. He retired from this University in 1999 A.D.

He was a delegate in the Intenational Congress of Orientalists held in Paris in 1973 and also in Mexico City in 1976.

His most well-known publication is A Comprehansive History of Jainism (2 vols.) which was published by the Firma KLM, Calcutta (1976 and 1984). This work has already been reprinted by the Mushiram Manoharlal, New Delhi in 2000 A.D. We hope that his present work on Buddhism covering the entire history of the this religion which also contains a close study of the Pall Tripitaka and history of vicissitudes of Buddhism in the Indian sub-continent till 1000 A.D., will be most welcome in the world of Indologists of modern times.

After the publication of my Book of Jainism in 2000 A.D. I was requested by my friends and well-wishers to write a similar book on Indian Buddhism, and I am happy to announce that the present work will probably satisfy those who are interested in Indology and other related subjects. As I have done in my earlier works, this is once more,- a source-oriented text, and naturally Indologists, both in India and also of the West will welcome the publication of the present text, which is of considerable size and it has also some 60 photographs.

I have mainly used the admirable edition published recently by Pali publication Board of Bihar Government. I have been able to purchase the entire text, running to 41 volumes, and I must thank the Mahabodhi Book Depot and its enterprising manager (a good-looking Srilankan gentleman). I now posses all its volumes, except the second volume of the Majjhima. I also have good translations of those volumes, both in Hindi and English.

Luckily for us, we have good libraries in Kolkata, some of them were established more than 200 years ago. As a retired teacher of Calcutta University. I had the privilege of using the great university library, a branch of which is now in the Alipore Campus of Calcutta, which is not for from my residence and also the great National Library, which is also located near this campus, on the opposite footpath. We have the Asiatic Society and the Sanskrit College Library, and also the Mahabodhi Society, near the College Street. My personal library is also there, and I have to depend on it, with the other libraries of Kolkata.

The present writer does not believe in the existence of the previous Buddhas, like the earlier Tirthankaras; and this is the reason why in this work, then is no separate chapter on the Earlier Buddhas. Even then, we have discussed them, elsewhere, in the present work, as they are mentioned in pre-christian epigraphs and literature.

In the first seventeen chapters we have discussed, exhaustively, Buddha's life and activities and we have left no stone unturned to make our work as lively as possible. We have always used original sources, including both Pali and Sanskrit texts. All the views, expressed are our own. We have fullest deference for both Buddha and his great disciples. It was nothing short of miracle, that a young person, with practically no training in the traditional Sastras of India, could mesemerise learned and incluential Brahmins and potentates of that age, and make his views vastly popular in the greater part of Northern India, in practically no time, and before the emergence of the Mauryas; this new religion became the dominant religious system of this sub-continent.

**Contents and Sample Pages**